Should I store markdown instead of HTML into database fields?
8th September 2013
My answer to Should I store markdown instead of HTML into database fields? on Quora
You should store the exact format that was entered by the user.
- This lets you offer an “edit” feature without round-tripping between two formats.
- This makes debugging much easier
- Related: if you need to investigate a security bug, having the original input is essential.
If you’re worried about performance, you can cache the transformed HTML somewhere—or even denormalize it to an extra table column. Just make sure you always have the original input available.
More recent articles
- Meta's new model is Muse Spark, and meta.ai chat has some interesting tools - 8th April 2026
- Anthropic's Project Glasswing - restricting Claude Mythos to security researchers - sounds necessary to me - 7th April 2026
- The Axios supply chain attack used individually targeted social engineering - 3rd April 2026